Dish is great - until you have to deal with them

[kesslerm]

I've been a relatively happy Dish customer for the past 3+ years. I originally had Voom (my first DBS experience) and got 'moved' to Dish. After a delay and a poor install, I had a 942 and 811 up and running. I've been running pretty good since that day a few years ago. Although I'll never understand why one of my OTA HD channels would never work on the 811 and worked fine with the 942. Although I was an early HD adopter, I didn't see a good reason to upgrade to the MPEG 4 receivers. I still don't understand how more compression would give as good of a picture. Plus having to invest $$ to get the 942, I didn't feel I should give more $$$ to get a 622 or 722.

Since I'm a frequent reader here, I knew about the 'upgrade' that would be coming. I started getting quite a few notices to upgrade, but kept delaying. When I heard that July 31st would be the deadline to upgrade for free and probably the end of the MPEG 2 channels, I finally gave in. I took the latest date they would let me install (happens to be today, the 13th.) I knew it would take a great effort to watch all of the recordings that have accumalted on the 942. Also, knowing about my initial install delays, figured I should give them as much time as possible to make sure my equipment would be available. Actually I was hoping they would run out of the (outdated) 622's and be upgraded to the 722. (Seems only fair since I bought into the best equipment at the time.)

That brings me to yesterday (12th). I was fully expecting a call that would indicate a go or no go to the install. What do you know. A recording from Dish saying the install is on and to make sure to have enough room around equipment. Great, I won't have to reschedule my time off or install. Almost seemed too smooth. Maybe some of the problems have been ironed out with E*.

Then today, install is at noon. I plan on sleeping in (good way to spend a PTO day.) I get a call shortly after 8:00 AM from the installer. He says "Sorry, but he doesn't have any high def equipment." I was hoping that meant "out of 622's". Completely prepared to say "Fine, just install a 722". But no, he says he is completely out of high def equipment, no 622's, no 722's, no dishes, no other receivers. Says he's been out for 10 days and Dish keeps delaying his shipment. Let's me know he hate's to be calling all of the customers and telling them that, but setup another install for 2 weeks out. He seemed 'somewhat' hopeful that the equipment would be there by then.

UN-FRICKEN-BELIEVABLE. You mean that neither HIM nor DISH knew that there would not be equipment ready for today. I absolutely cannot believe that this happened again. I called Dish to vent but wouldn't even know what they could do to make it right. I think I would have cancelled if my wife wasn't in the middle of recording every single olympic show. All of this and Charlie wonders how they lost 25k customers during the quarter.

So, what do you think? Should I send this to CEO? Could I have done something different? Thanks for reading.

MK

 

[RTCDude]

I've been a relatively happy Dish customer for the past 3+ years. I originally had Voom (my first DBS experience) and got 'moved' to Dish. After a delay and a poor install, I had a 942 and 811 up and running.
.
.
.
.
MK

The title made me laugh, because it's so true!

 

[omarh]

Sometimes it seems like its hard to get decent service these days from just about anyone....

 

[DishSatUser]

If you have a good complaint, and it certainly is in this case, send it to the CEO.

Who knows, you may help to provide significant improvements to how E* assists it's customers and making sure equipment is on hand for a scheduled install.

Plus maybe you'll get some credit or consolation stuff too!

 

[tomcrown1]

Dish is out of equipment and they have known this for at least two months. Dish is becomming a bad monster when it comes to customer service.

 

[ka1z0ku]

Sorry to hear that you're having trouble getting a new receiver, I live way out in the boonies and I had no trouble getting a 722 (although it was a few months ago...). I did, however, have to argue with the installation company that I had a clear view of the southern sky (there is a small tree in my front yard that doesn't even come close to blocking 110/119/61.5 in a 2-dish setup) and subsequently I've spent quite a lot of time haggling with CSRs to get to where I am now, HD Only w/ lots of free premiums, still no HD locals but I fixed that with an OTA antenna last nite.

Anyway, I agree that E*'s customer service is extremely lacking.

P.S. MPEG-4 is honestly a better codec than MPEG-2, it slashes file size in most cases, meaning more bandwidth for either enhanced quality or more channels. In the future (maybe not by the end of the year, but further down the road after E* has a few more birds in the sky) we'll probably see the current "HD-lite" problem go away thanks to MPEG-4 or even a more efficient codec that will be introduced.

 

[riffjim4069]

MK,

I have been in similar situations with both V* and E*, but why a rep from Dish Network can't contact you to cancel your order with at least 48-hours of notice is beyond my understanding...especially when they don't have the equipment in the warehouses.

I hope you have better luck next time.

 

[nicknageli]

I've even had poor service from the CEO group. I had two issues that I was working with them on and both CEO people just stopped responding to e-mail messages part way through the resolution.

 

[Visitor]

This doesn't surprise me as well. I've had Dish for 6 years now and service in the earlier years of my sub was ok - the CSRs seemed to at least know what they were doing. Today, I'm afraid to call them for anything and their installers weren't too much better. (And I say their installers because around here they work for Dish Network LLC and not an outside contractor).

 

[okiekevn]

Since I'm a frequent reader here, I knew about the 'upgrade' that would be coming. I started getting quite a few notices to upgrade, but kept delaying. When I heard that July 31st would be the deadline to upgrade for free and probably the end of the MPEG 2 channels,



MK

so you started getting quite a few notices, perhaps while they had the equipment, and you waited until the ulitmate last minute on purpose. you snooze you lose, earlybird gets the worm, first come first serve...i could go on.

 

[jmnstevens]

Well in a few months they will have my HD equipment when I cancel! I view them as one of the worst companies in how they treat their customers and add them to the list of of companies such as Comcast that I will laugh about when I see them bought out of filing for Chapter 7.

 

[EmpireState]

Yep, been there. I was a 10 year Dish Network subscriber who finally decided to go from SD to HD this spring. I signed up for my big Dish upgrade to the full-on HD + DVR package and waited almost a month for it to happen. A very short period of time before the install date I received a message on my answering machine from the local dish installer telling me they wouldn't do it because of the inability to do an electrical ground versus a cold water ground ... I hope I remember that correctly. Something about legal reasons, anyway they cancelled the install. It was back to the drawing board after that and I had to find an indy installer that was willing to install with a cold water ground at my townhome complex. It cost me a few extra dollars to finally make it happen too.

I was pretty disappointed by the lack of communication between Dish and the local dudes and the short notification. Nothing worse than waiting an extra few weeks for the HD I was anxious for. The Dish CSR also promised me Sci-Fi and USA in HD when I signed up at the tail end of February for a March install. Little bit of a wait on that too.

I feel your pain. New subs and upgraders should call Dish and the installer regularly to make sure everything is still on track. Dish CSR's should tell that to customers.

 

[ehren]

Sorry to hear that you're having trouble getting a new receiver, I live way out in the boonies and I had no trouble getting a 722 (although it was a few months ago...). I did, however, have to argue with the installation company that I had a clear view of the southern sky (there is a small tree in my front yard that doesn't even come close to blocking 110/119/61.5 in a 2-dish setup) and subsequently I've spent quite a lot of time haggling with CSRs to get to where I am now, HD Only w/ lots of free premiums, still no HD locals but I fixed that with an OTA antenna last nite.

Anyway, I agree that E*'s customer service is extremely lacking.

P.S. MPEG-4 is honestly a better codec than MPEG-2, it slashes file size in most cases, meaning more bandwidth for either enhanced quality or more channels. In the future (maybe not by the end of the year, but further down the road after E* has a few more birds in the sky) we'll probably see the current "HD-lite" problem go away thanks to MPEG-4 or even a more efficient codec that will be introduced.

B.S. B.S B.S it will give Dish more reason to cram more channels per transponder. You can count on it. Just like they lie that they have 100 national HD channels.

 

[Walker1]

Sometimes it seems like its hard to get decent service these days from just about anyone....

That's assuming you can A) Get through the GD auto menus with the dumb a*s attendant and B) You get a rep who cares about helping you resolve your problem and knows what he/she is talking about.

 

[avchong]

I've even had poor service from the CEO group. I had two issues that I was working with them on and both CEO people just stopped responding to e-mail messages part way through the resolution.

I also recently had the same experience where some twit at the CEO group refused to answer my followup e-mails. Even the customer service at the CEO group seem to have gone down the drain. So sad.

 

[Islandguy43]

I also recently had the same experience where some twit at the CEO group refused to answer my followup e-mails. Even the customer service at the CEO group seem to have gone down the drain. So sad.

I imagine the ceo group is overwhelmed, with complaints, and only responds to the ones they can be the hero on.

I had what I thought was good contact at ceo group, whom helped me with my nhl ci subscription billing last year and a starz rebate. The last couple times I have emailed him about future programing etc, I haven't even got an acknowledgement. Makes you wonder if the left hand knows what the right hand is doing